A Maoist cult leader has been found guilty of a string of sex assaults and rapes, cruelty and imprisoning his daughter in a commune for 30 years.
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Known as Comrade Bala within the women-only collective he founded 40 years ago, the communist carried out a campaign of violence and degradation against women over several decades.
In reality, her mother lived inside the commune with her until she died after falling from a window in 1997.
The decades of torture and confinement have, understandably, had a profound effect on the life of Aravindan Balakrishnan’s daughter.
Balakrishnan established the Workers’ Institute of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought at Acre Lane in Brixton, south London in 1975 and turned it into a secretive cult in which he led a small group of no more than 10 women in what he believed was preparation for China to take over the world and create “an worldwide dictatorship of the proletariat”. “I believe justice has been done and I am happy with the result but at the end of the day he is still my dad”.
She was never allowed to meet people her own age and in 30 years never left the house alone, except for one occasion.
Aravindan had told the jury that he was jailed for six months in 1978 along with a number of other members of the collective following a police raid.
“I’ve been cursed, insulted, mocked, denigrated, excluded, beaten up, caged up like a wild animal, deprived of what really matters to me, presumed upon, imposed upon – the list is endless”.
She said: “I just had enough”. Like a fly in a spider’s web.
Two more women – a British woman, who is now 64 and was in the cult from 1979-89, and a Malaysian woman, who was involved from 1977-92 – then came forward with allegations that he beat, raped and sexually assaulted them.
The pensioner denied the abuse, and insisted the women vied for his affection and he treated his daughter with compassion.
It was reported Siti Aishah, of Jelebu, Negri Sembilan, won a Commonwealth scholarship to London in the late 1960s but cut off contact with her family after coming under Balakrisnan’s influence.
He was also convicted of rape and sexual assault of fellow cult members. However, as the verdicts were delivered, one of his former followers, Josephine Herivel, shouted across the courtroom floor: “You are sending an innocent man to prison”.
Praising the victims, chief crown prosecutor for London Baljit Ubhey said: “Balakrishnan has robbed these women including his own daughter of a huge part of their lives”.
He was found not guilty of one count of indecent assault and one count of actual bodily harm against one of the women.
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Balakrishnan was remanded in custody to be sentenced on 29 January 29.
